The present invention relates generally to broadband antennas, and specifically to a bi-blade antenna with century bandwidth (i.e. 100 to 1) which enables it to radiate and receive electromagnetic energy at UHF-Band, L-Band, C-Band, S-Band and X-Band.
The F-111 aircraft contains over 100 separate antennas. This large number of antennas has, up until presently, been considered essential since the aircraft transmits and receives a variety of signals which span many octaves of bandwidth.
The task of providing a single antenna which operates over many spans of bandwidth is alleviated, to some extent, by the systems of the following U.S. Patents, which are incorporated herein by reference:
U.S. Pat. No. 3,680,127 issued to D. J. Richard on 25, Jul. 1972;
U.S. Pat. No. 3,015,101 issued to E. Turner et al on 26, Dec. 1961;
U.S. Pat. No. 3,509,465 issued to Andre et al on 28, Apr. 1970; and
U.S. Pat. No. 3,618,104 issued to L. Behr on Nov. 2, 1971.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,618,104 discloses a broadband low-profile circularly polarized antenna having a form factor comprising a cornucopia-shaped element. U.S. Pat. No. 3,509,465 discloses a tunnel diode amplifier integrated into a printed circuit equiangular spiral antenna in which the antenna elements are used as a portion of the amplifier transmission line.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,680,127 discloses a tunable omni-directional antenna having two loaded, concentric, semicircular radiating members. U.S. Pat. No. 3,015,101 discloses an antenna consisting of one or more elements each essentially a coplanar equiangular stub antenna with a folded over shorted base, the general configuration being that of a scimitar blade.
While the systems described above are exemplary in the art, the need remains to provide a multi-octave antenna element which has excellent time dispersion properties; and will radiate and receive at UHF-Band, L-Band, C-Band, X-Band, K-Band and beyond. The present invention is intended to satisfy that need.